Renew On Line (UK) 28

Extracts from the Sept-Oct 2000 edition of Renew
These extracts only represent about 25% of it

World roundup

Green China

A recent International Symposium on Renewable Energy Development, held in China by the World Energy Council and others, heard that China has a 254 million kilowatts of recoverable wind energy, with 200,000 small wind generators already installed and more than 20 large wind farms established. There are also 50,000 small hydropower stations. Tidal energy potential of more than 20 million kilowatts is available with a dozen power stations already built. A geothermal capacity of 3.5 million kilowatts could be put to use, and 300 million tons of feedstock for bioenergy are available each year. Further, 7.6 million families have marsh methane ponds which turn agricultural waste into fuel.

Overall, China has become the world’s largest renewable energy consuming country- up to one fourth of its total energy demand. And in the latest 5 year plan the country plans to increase its renewable energy content by 10 percent per year. However, there does not seem to have been any mention of the likely energy contribution of the controversial Three Gorges Dam.

China, the second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases after the U.S, has cut its energy demand growth to half the rate of growth of the economy, according to a case study from the Pew Center on Global Climate Change.

Visit the Pew Center at http://www.pewclimate.org/

and the World Energy Council: http://www.wec.co.uk/

Green Japan

The Marubeni Corporation has announced that it plans to build a 26 megawatt wind farm in Japan. In April Marubeni created the Minami-Kyushu Wind Power Corp. to develop the project and apply for a government subsidy from the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization to support the project.

The New Energy organization is affiliated with MITI, the Ministry of International Trade and Industry. MITI has plans to promote the development of green energy in the nation, up to 3.1 percent by 2010, by forcing electric retail power companies to purchase a portion of their electricity that is generated from renewable sources - wind, solar, biomass and run-of-the-river small hydro systems.

The heart of the MITI plan involves the establishment of a Green Credit System where the government would issue certificates to electricity producers (which in Japan are separate from retail power companies) equal to the amount of renewable energy generated. In turn, retail electric companies would be obligated to buy renewable energy, or the certificates, from the producers. MITI, through the New Energy organization, would also create subsidies for renewable energy projects.

In the end, Japanese consumers would pay for this. However, the MITI plan would make it financially feasible for companies to enter into the renewable energy business, thus spur the development of new business and resulting job opportunities in the still economically troubled nation.

MITI has been instrumental in the past for bringing economic prosperity to Japan by creating a hit list of specific products for Japanese businesses to target in international markets. MITI’s success could do for green energy what it did to bring high-quality small cars, electronics and a host of other products to consumers worldwide. Source: Energies

Changes in Australia

Australia may have been dragging its feet on Climate Change, having won acceptance of increased emissions at Kyoto, but change does seem to be underway. Whereas its quite normal to have progressive policies on renewables and so on coming from New South Wales and Victoria, Queensland, which has traditionally been one of Australia's largest coal producers with exports to the EU and Asia, will not be giving any more generation licenses to coal fired power stations. Instead its going for gas, with, for example, a new pipeline from Townsville to Gladstone and a major gas-fired power station at Townsville. In addition, there is a retail license condition to be introduced in 2005 requiring electricity retailers to source 15% of the electricity they sell in Queensland from gas or renewable sources. This and more is included in a new Queensland Energy Policy- 'A Cleaner Energy Strategy', which also proposes a $50 million allocation for renewable and Energy Efficiency.

See http://www.statedevelopment.qld.gov.au/about/newsroom/mediareleases/clean_energy.pdf

Wind in Belgium

Belgium may only have a short coastline on the North Sea, but it still hopes to build offshore wind power to achieve a national goal of getting 3.5 percent of its electricity from renewables. The Belgian Energy Ministry wants to begin soliciting bids for offshore wind power - although this plan still has to be approved by the cabinet. If approved, the Belgium power company Electrabel has already expressed an interest in building wind parks off the Belgian coast. Visit Electrabel at http://www.electrabel.be

Embedded US

A new US Energy Department report has identified ‘distributed power’ projects as a way to reduce power outages. According to the report, distributed power systems that produce electricity on site can reduce the amount of power utility companies need during peak demand and help prevent power outages- blackouts and brown outs are common in the USA.

The report, "Making Connections: Case Studies of Barriers to Interconnection of Distributed Power," is the first to document the problems the developers of distributed electricity generation projects encounter while attempting to interconnect to the electric grid.

On site generation, or distributed electricity generation, allows residential, commercial and industrial customers to produce their own electricity by using smaller, decentralized, electrical generation systems located at or close to their facilities. Power sources for distributed electricity generation systems include fuel cells, microturbines, photovoltaics, wind turbines and combined heat and power systems. The technology reduces the need to build new large central generating plants or transmission and distribution lines. The report concludes that distributed power systems at industrial plants or commercial buildings can be more energy efficient and provide greater reliability on site than conventional central generating stations.

See http://www.eren.doe.gov/distributedpower/barriersreport/

German PV boom

A photovoltaic solar boom has been created in Germany by the latest amendments to the renewable energy feed-in support system (see Renew 125) under which producers must be paid fixed amounts per kilowatt hour (kWh). From April, the tariff for photovoltaic solar rose from euros 0.08 (DM0.16) per kWh to euros 0.51 per kWh.

ENDS reports that ‘consumers responded by besieging the bank responsible for granting loans under a government scheme to encourage householders and housing associations to invest in solar. During March, the German bank for reconstruction (KfW) received subsidy applications totaling 23MW capacity, equivalent to two-and-a-half times that installed during 1999, and 35% of the country's total installed capacity. As the total funds available for 2000 neared exhaustion, the government was forced to freeze further loans.’

Under the new scheme more money is available for loans (an extra euros 20.5m (DM40m) per year), but to dampen demand, higher interest rates are charged and the loan period has been reduced to 2003, which is now set as the new target date for achieving 100,000 solar equipped roofs, i.e one year earlier that previously expected.

See http://www.bmwi.de/infomaterial/photovoltaik.html

Wind Catches up

In the 1970's and 1980's there were valiant, if evidently premature, attempts to build multi-megawatt wind turbines, like the NASA/Boeing Mod 2 series, the German Growian, and the 3MW WEG machine on the Orkney. Some of these large hi-tech machines failed, and all were abandoned eventually in favour of the smaller designs emerging from Denmark (although we ought to pay homage to the 2 MW Tvind Machine, which did work- but then it was built by school students not high tech engineers!). Now however, following a process of incremental development, the scale is climbing back up, with offshore location being the next focus: see the report in our Technology Section

Interestingly, NEC Micon have now installed a 2MW machine on Orkney, alongside the now dormant 3MW ex-WEG machine. NEG Micon already have a 1.5MW unit on the site- the new device is being tested, ready for offshore application. So the two new machines now outsize the old model...

Meanwhile, in Denmark tenders have been put out for the first of five 150MW offshore demonstration projects, and a 40MW Danish offshore project is under construction, all part of the massive Danish offshore wind programme- which hopes to see 4000MW installed by 2030. Not to be outdone, the Netherlands is looking o 1250MW by 2020.

However, back in May, following the Offshore Wind Conference held in Sicily, Windpower Monthly (May) sounded a note of caution, pointing out that so far there was only 30MW of offshore wind capacity in place and much of this was is sheltered waters. There was therefore a way to go before offshore wind was a mature option- another case for incremental development?